The Byzantine Feast of St. Benedict in Rome

No Future for Russian (Byzantine-rite) Catholics?

Catholic Herald: World meeting of Russian Catholics hailed as ‘last hurrah’ for movement by Natasha Marsh

Gratitude as the Fruit of Repentence

Discerning the Historical Causes for the Fall of a Polity

I recall having read in certain Latin apologetic works on Church History that attributed the success of the Muslim invasions of the Christian world to the moral laxity and softness of Christians and their heresy (the Nestorians and Monophysites!). This may strike one as being an expression of Latin triumphalism, given the weakness of the Latin churches today

What if it is the case that the invasions were successful because the Christian polities were simply too weak? Must we find some moral blame for this? Or what if the polities failed because they were not Christianized enough -- not with respect to the "private" lives of individuals or expressions of orthodoxy, but because the polities lacked the excellence proper to it?

While those who lived with empire may have seen it as the only way to deal with external threats, what if they were wrong? Could it be said that the Byzantine theme system was close to being an expression of republicanism? Or were they effective purely for military reasons? What if despite the expression of public orthodoxy, the imperial government was not the form desired by God?

Would God save those who refuse to do what is necessary to save themselves? Lepanto, other victories have been interpreted as God intervening (especially through the intercession of the Mother of God). Still, Christians usually had to do their part in securing victory over the Muslims. While God's primary causality is not to be denied, and miracles are possible, what if God prefers Christian polities to participate in the Divine, in their own way, but attaining the excellence proper to them? Could God miraculously have intervened in preventing the Holy Land from being conquered by the Muslims? Did He withhold this help because of the private sins of the Christians living there, or as a consequence of other failures? Or did He have other reasons for allowing this to happen?

Not a Surprise

Dr. Mike Augros going back to New England -- President McLean Names First Members to Team for New England Campus

One Against Changing the Discipline

CWR Dispatch: The Amazon Indult? by Rev. Peter M.J. Stravinskas
For the sake of argument, let’s say that an indult were granted to the beleaguered bishops of the Amazon, can one suppose that it will end there? History teaches otherwise.

Eastern Christian Books: The Politicization of Marian Devotion

Eastern Christian Books: The Politicization of Marian Devotion

Livestreaming a Mass

Tomorrow...

Creating a Prayer Routine

Holy Virgin Protection Cathedral

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Tradition Without Fundamentalism

The Prayer of St. Ephrem the Syrian

Personality Types and the Priesthood

St. Gregory Palamas and St. Thomas Aquinas

The Triumph of Orthodoxy

Altare Dei Issue No. 3

"Hellenism, Orthodoxy, and Religious Freedom"

Not In This Pontificate

Perhaps never.

First Things: Return to Form by Martin Mosebach
A Call for the Restoration of the Roman Rite

It is a moral outrage that those who gutted the Roman Rite because of their presumption and delusion were permitted to rob a future generation of their full Catholic . . . . Continue Reading »

Not the One to Try to Implement This Change

Crux: Pope Francis Signals Openness to Ordaining Married Men